Prior Art: An Asador is a professional who cooks with wood and fire. Cooking with a ground fire is a method common in the southern regions of South America where natural wood is burned down into coals and harvested to support the cooking process. Spits have been around of centuries. Examples of two spits mounted to a separate spit frame are found in the 1885 U.S. Pat. No. 311,662 to Knight. The patent shows two cooperating spits, one with three prongs and another with two prongs. One fork is inserted in one end of a piece of meat and the other fork is inserted in the opposite end of the meat and the handle on each fork is inserted in the separate spit frame in an operative state. There are no tie-down holes to hold large cuts of meat if the spits are used in stand along vertical position suspended from the spit handle or impaled in a dirt surface. Another example of a spit is found in the 1968 U.S. Pat. No. 3,381,606 to Kodey. Kodey teaches a device with a pointed business end and no tie-down holes. The device is configured to be used with a separate frame for roasting in a horizontal position. U.S. Pat. No. 3,745,910 to Delamater teaches a spit with a plurality of tines in a circular configuration. The tines have no tie-down holes and the tines are designed for roasting small cuts of meat such as wieners and the spit of Delamater is not designed to be impaled in a ground surface. Referring “Wikipedia” and looking under the word “Churrasco”, several spits are pictured with a variety of tips. However, these tips are either cone shaped, limited to four triangular faces with less than sharp cutting edges, or structurally not designed for large cuts of meat. The one or more blades of the present invention each have a novel tip portion having a plurality of faces that form a plurality of sharp cutting edges, allowing the spit to easily impale large cuts of meat such as steaks and roasts. The present invention may be employed horizontally or vertically over a bed of hot coals. The present invention, the blade corner portion asador spit, is distinguished from prior art by its sheer versatility. It is designed to vertically slow roast large cuts of meat while suspended from a line or impaled into the ground over an extremely high heat source, such a bed of hot coals. Additionally, the present invention is designed for horizontal applications, for example, it may be impaled in a stand, interlocked with a like asador spit, or propped on rocks over the bed of hot coals. Also, cooking devices such as a cast iron kettle or a wire grate may be suspended from the present invention when it is employed horizontally over the heat source. The capability of single or multi-prong culinary tools to penetrate heavy cuts of meat and maintain their structure, and to resist warping during high heat applications, the most prevalent method of employment envisioned for this invention, is critical for understanding why the present invention is superior to other prior art spit designs. Temperature, size, tip, tie-downs, and handgrip are all considerations that must be addressed when designing the asador spit.
Temperature: When working with single or multi-prong implements over high heat (in excess of 750 degrees Fahrenheit); the metals of many implements may break down and eventually rust making the implements unsanitary for culinary usage. Moreover, extremely high heat levels—the type of heat required to properly sear a steak—cause non-tempered metals to warp, thus dealigning a pointed end of a spit's prong making the process of impaling tough fibered and fat marbled meat (e.g. a Ribeye steak) not only dangerous, but virtually impossible. It has been determined that there are two optimum steels from a region of the world that addresses all of the requirements for effective spit design. Northern Europe is a region of the world that still blends high quality metals with Old World hand-forging craftsmanship. Tempered Swedish Boron steel is the preferred raw material because of its inherent hardness and ability to perform consistently with high heat. Specially formulated stainless steel that has been hand annealed in a coal fire is the second metal that we've found suitable. Although many believe that stainless steel can not be tempered to a point where it meets minimum hardness levels for tooling, a condition largely due to chromium being added to the metallurgy to gives the metal its shine, a highly skilled blacksmith can temper stainless steel by hand if he uses a coal fire and he can bond the carbon molecules with the steel at the right temperature. What's unique to both of these metals is the fact that both metals have to be handled by skilled blacksmiths using proprietary recipes that have literally been handed down for hundreds of years. In most cases, manufacturers of many prior art designs order steel from a catalog and build their tools in an automated fashion based on the cheapest materials available. Because many applications are single purpose designs, this process is sufficient. However, many of the tools based on single purpose designs have narrow load and temperatures ranges and usually fail in scenarios that involve the roasting of a large mass of meat under high temperatures.
Size: A spit blade that is too thick and too wide increases the frictional force when impaling tough cuts of meat and makes the impaling more difficult and less safe. Moreover, when inserting the spit blade 2 inches into the ground for roasting vertically, a blade that is too wide has a tendency to break apart and displace more of the hard packed soil than is necessary, causing the spit to lose support of the surrounding soil resulting in the spit tipping over and falling into the dirt. Additionally, physically inserting the blade into fibrous meat safely on an intended path is very difficult and the frictional force to be overcome increases with each additional blade. When designing spits with an odd number of blades, for example a spit having three blades, making the center blade slightly longer than the two side blades allows the maximum force to be applied to a single point during an initial puncture quickly followed by additional punctures by the two sides blades safely penetrating the fibrous meat on the intended path. When designing a spit with an even number of blades, for example a spit with two blades, the two blades should be of the some length, and for a spit with an even number of blades greater than two, the two central blades should be of the same length and slightly longer that the other blades.
The Tip: One of the biggest engineering challenges of the present invention is designing the tip portion that can safely impale meat and be physically driven into the ground during vertical slow roasting applications. Preferably, a hardened spit has the tip portion heat treated for additional strength. Another important consideration is a dealignment of a spit's tip point. A dealignment occurs when the tip point warps while the tip point is employed at different angles. The dealignment may make the process of impaling a meat impossible and dangerous. Any metal, regardless of how it is formulated or crafted, may warp when employed under heavy loads at high temperatures. For the present invention, several prototypes tested to failure under high temperatures and heavy loads established baseline configurations and physical specifications. The preferred tip point has preferably 8 triangular flat faces forming 10 cutting edges, allowing each of the blades to expand the blade's initial puncture hole into the meat.
Tie-Down Holes: When a heavy cut of meat is roasted vertically over a fire, some form of “tie” (kitchen twine is the most practical) must be used to keep the meat from physically sliding off the spit and falling to the ground or into the fire. The plurality of tie-down holes of the present invention is configured so that at least one “tie” may be placed across or through the heavy cut of meat and used to secure the meat to the spit of the present invention. For example, for a spit with a rear tie-down hole and a forward tie-down hole, once the “tie” is placed across the heavy cut of meat, one end of the “tie” may be inserted through the rear tie-down hole, and another end of the tie may be placed through the forward tie-down hole, and the ends of the “tie” pulled tight to take any slack out the “tie” and the ends of the “tie” secured to each other holding the heavy cut of meat in its preferred roasting position.
Handgrip: The handgrip of the present invention is designed to have a slight “flare” on a handgrip distal end. This “flare” aids the user in holding the present invention vertically. For example, when transferring the spit from a kitchen to a fire area while the spit is laden with a heavy cut of meat, the “flare” allows the spit to be comfortably held vertically with the pointed end composed of one or more tip points being closest to the ground. Although it is recommended that the user have clean and dry hands, it is expected that some users will have slippery palms due to residues from coatings, such as a seasoning and an olive oil, applied to the meat. The “flare” will make the spit less likely to slip out of the user's hand. Moreover, the flared handgrip makes the spit easier to hold at chest level while preparing to suspend the spit from a hold point located above a fire. For example, one end of a wire can be attached to a suspension hold in the handgrip and the other end of the wire can be attached to the hold point, allowing the spit to be suspended over the fire. A brisket can weight 15 pounds and the spit may take 30-45 seconds to attach to a hold point using the suspension means, making the flared handgrip instrumental in the user maintaining positive control of the spit.